To date there are numerous classes of very resistant surface coatings but these coatings generally require relatively heavy-duty logistics and when it is advisable to change them due to degradation or due to a change of decoration, the latter operation proves equally tedious.
Thus, today, when a user seeks to change a decorative coating on the floor, for example of the tiling type, usually the latter is removed and then relatively heavy work must be undertaken in order to lay a new type of tiled floor. It is the same when a user desires to change a kitchen worktop coupled with the tiling present around it.
While the passion of the public for redecoration work does not cease, it is increasingly advisable to find solutions that facilitate this type of work for users and most particularly for amateur users.
It has already been proposed, regarding flooring, to use mortars constituted of artificial agglomerates of mineral or synthetic grains, notably quartz grains, combined in a resin, notably an epoxide or polyurethane resin.
Such coatings may typically be manufactured from quartz grains known as “extra-siliceous” quartz grains obtained from purified sand. After their manufacture, these coatings are poured and spread on the floor using tools.
Thus coatings are obtained that can advantageously replace other types of carpet- or tiling-type coatings.
Nevertheless such coatings have the drawback of requiring, in order to lay them, a manufacturing process that is both long and inconvenient.
To solve this type of problem, it has been envisaged to provide this type of coating in the form of hard or semi-rigid slabs. Such slabs are nevertheless not completely satisfactory in so far as they remain brittle and need to be heated at the moment they are laid in order to be able to marry up various surface inhomogeneities.